Wullie

I was a ST holder last season, mine is £100 cheaper this season (not that I'm renewing, I won the last one). Suspect you'll see them win more before the end of August than I did all season.

This is just how the rules of cup competitions work. If they'd got to the FA Cup semi final and brought an ineligible player off the bench for 30 seconds at the end of a 3-0 win they'd be kicked out of the competition. It just feels like a harsh punishment because of the nature of the play offs and the long term benefits of the potential reward but it's not really. Loads of teams have been kicked out of cup competitions for the tiniest of infractions, and this wasn't even that, it was a deliberate attempt to cheat. Boo hoo. https://www.theguardian.com/football/2023/nov/22/barnsley-kicked-out-of-fa-cup-for-ineligible-player-as-horsham-reinstated https://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/aug/08/celtic-reinstated-champions-league-uefa-legia-warsaw

If Rogers got that goal given against Man United, I think this would have been us tonight.

Hull have a point like. During the last Euros, England had to play Spain in the final on the Sunday having not known who they were playing until the Wednesday before the game - disgrace.

Given that Swindon were expelled from the Johnstone's Paint Trophy or whatever the hell it's called now for fielding ineligible players earlier this season due to admin errors, it seems perfectly reasonable that Saints are expelled from the play offs, that's just what happens if you cheat in a cup competition which is effectively what the play offs are.

Agree, it's knocked me sick. An absolute disgrace.

Prime example there in the FA Cup final: fans and players screaming for handball when it's the most obvious non-penalty you've ever seen in your life. Yet nobody from Celtic asked for a penalty that they now claim was blatant and obvious all along. Ok lads.

Celtic Park shouted unanimously today for a handball when Stephen Kingsley headed the ball with his hands nowhere near his head. And yet despite several thousand of them being yards away from the incident on Wednesday, there was no call of hands from any of them, fans or players. Weird. It's almost as if, in real life rather than in a grainy still image, it very obviously wasn't handled.

I think it's the closest thing I've seen in football to those clips in cricket you see where the ball looks like it has hit the ground when it is obvious from the reaction of the players on the field that it is a clean catch. It's a "clear handball" that was only visible to the guy watching on a single camera situated on halfway, nobody else sees it? Come on.

The Celtic players don't appeal and the several thousand Celtic fans standing yards away don't appeal, the ball does not hit his hand, I don't care how much grainy freeze frames I'm shown. It's made me feel really despondent about football in general this morning and that's without skin in the game. I thought the reaction of the Motherwell manager was right: "the question to ask is what are we even doing here?"

Workington v Cleethorpes for me tomorrow. Bagging the ground on the penultimate match before they bulldoze it.

I was at Hebburn for the game against FC United and Neil was there then too. It's a great set up at Hebburn like, I was well impressed.

I love this Paully, we've been to Seaham more than anywhere else just to see him. Last time we were there he was in the middle of a tirade at the ref when the opposition goalkeeper jogged over and said "Is he allowed to talk to you like that ref?" to which Collingwood responded "fuck off you, you pie eating cunt!"

If you're going to Seaham make sure to position yourself right against the home dugout. Seaham's foul mouthed perma-furious manager Mark Collingwood is the best entertainment in the Northern League.

Bigger/deeper squads with useful academies to fill in More players used to doing it Possession based games which involve less chasing about Ability to thump opponents and kill games early (this is now much more difficult in the modern PL than even 2 years ago) Less fucking ludicrous cup draws that don't involve playing Man City once a month You basically need several years of CL qualification on the spin in order to build the revenue and the appeal in order to have a squad that is capable of both qualifying year on year and actually competing when you get there. It's incredibly difficult as a club like Villa or Newcastle to qualify and not be wiped out by the schedule the next year.

It's also impossible to separate from the context of what happened to the other PL teams who got relative thrashings. There's very clear evidence that the combination of the schedule and the strength of the other PL teams is contributing to the players being exhausted by March and relatively fresh elite players being able not just to beat them but hammer them. More broadly, I bet there's a little bit of panic at Premier League HQ going forward. It's not good for the brand if all their supposedly amazing teams are knackered in spring but that's what the money has now done to the league, PSG and Barca can take it easy most weeks beating Metz and Elche 3-0 while Man City are being given a real game by Brentford/Wolves/Fulham.

I'm certainly embarrassed by the whinging of some of our arsehole supporters.

Adam Clery made a video a month or two ago about Villa's shooting from distance that's worth a watch. https://youtu.be/rjB9Qb-Hp_w?si=EoOUIOdq95WENyo0

From everything I've heard he's playing really well at Boro who are second in the Championship, he's been playing centre half the last few weeks because of their own injury issues and doing well. We'd be mad not to bring him back in the current situation. I've always thought Targett has been pretty steady for us when he's played, not sure why he's so unpopular.

Does my head in how every team has felt like they have to copy what everyone else is doing. Nobody was taking long throws 12 months ago, suddenly it's an essential part of the game even when you've got a pair of weedy full backs.

The really worrying thing with the away form is how daunting the rest of the away fixture list looks, just a big list of places we never win.

I think he's the best find of all their summer signings.

I think their keeper comes and collects the original throw in before the goal - Thiaw heads it away no more than 3 yards away from the goal, sorry but that's got to be your keeper's ball. The same goes for the Ballard header, he connects with it inside the six yard box, it's an easy claim if the goalkeeper comes out decisively.

We desperately need a left footed player for that position.

There was several times in the first half, all seemed to be in our right back position, where 6 or 7 mackems were all overpressing and chasing the ball like a bunch of puppies, there was an enormous amount of space on that field at times in the first half, we were just hopeless at exploiting it.